Here Come the Compacts

Sir:

Thank heaven the small cars are coming back again. In 1949 we finally got our first new car--a Plymouth club coupe. Now, ten years and three children later, we still have the same wonderful little car. We figure that if we hang on to the old '49er a while longer, it will be right back in style again. Hurray for the compact car with the nice price, power-nothing, and the good old stick shift.

MRS. ALICE KRAUKLIS Calumet City, Ill.

Sir:

You write that close to 1970 about 10 million cars per year will be sold. That can only mean that by then our roads will be so choked up that you can walk faster than a car can move.

Pedestrians, frightened chickens of America, the greatest time in your life is coming!

RICHARD A. RESTLE Toronto

Sir:

Your breathless account of all the high-level maneuvering at mighty G.M. to bring forth the Corvair mouse reads like a novel, but it's a lot of amiable nonsense. In this age of space miracles, why give so much importance to so small an accomplishment as moving a motor to the rear end? The day to celebrate a great achievement would be when G.M. designs a really safe car.

R. P. GHELARDI

Brooklyn

Sir:

If TIME'S threat of two cars in every garage comes true, we'll also need two hospitals in every block.

PHIL CLARK Boston

Sir:

The announcement of compact cars from Detroit reminds me of the story of the circus that advertised having "the biggest midget in the world."

JACK JANSEN

Anaheim, Calif.

"Disgraceful Episode"

Sir:

I consider that the press and photographic coverage of the Khrushchev visit [Oct. 5] was a disgraceful episode. This incident, probably because of its international importance, merely highlighted a behavior on the part of reporters and press photographers which seems to be increasing in absurdity in the last few years. I firmly believe in a free press, but I also believe that it is one duty of a free press to discipline itself. The use of "any trick of brain or brawn," to the point of rowdiness, is not to the credit of the press. T. S. CARSWELL Chestertown, Md.

Sir:

A salute to your staff for its delightful coverage of press capriciousness during Mr. K.'s visit. Good Lord, this is the profession I'm striving to enter !

JOHN MITCHELL

Twentynine Palms, Calif.

Righting a Wrong

Sir:

Space Scientist Wernher von Braun [Sept. 21], always more adept at obtaining newspaper space than in penetrating outer space, is also weak in the history of his adopted country. "My country, right or wrong" is no "old English saying" but a slight misquote of a toast by Stephen Decatur.*The English view was best expressed by G. K. Chesterton: " 'My country, right or wrong' ... is like saying My mother, drunk or sober.'

OSCAR MILLARD Pacific Palisades, Calif.

DAMP v. RUMP Sir: We were most interested in Senator Keating's accurate evaluation of the Democratic Astronautical Missile Program (DAMP) [Oct. 5]. However, he has failed to consider the obvious faults of the Republican United Missile Program (RUMP).

The Hot Rock is almost completely de pendent upon a lunar condition known as the "honey moon," and its assent is along a precalculated bridal path.

The Roaring Richard, while by far the most adequate, shows a definite tendency to follow the glide path already established by the General. So far, through extensive testing, it has shown a disinclination or a complete inability to establish an orbit of its own. MARGARET JOHNSON

Florence, Ariz.

Up & Around

Sir:

I wish to call your attention to the fact that the original Great Wallendas are not retired as your Oct. 5 article suggests. Not only are the original Waliendas performing today (Karl and Herman), but they are still doing their seven-people, three-high pyramid. BILLY BARTON (Mr. Sensation) Greencastle, Pa.

Award for Effort

Sir:

About that $1,000 "bonus" the University of Pennsylvania "bestowed" on 20 of its outstanding faculty members recently, "reportedly the first such ... by a U.S. college or university" [Oct. 5]: it may well have been the most, but it wasn't the first. In 1957 the Pennsylvania State University presented special checks ranging from $300 to $500 to seven members of its faculty.

LAWRENCE E. DENNIS Vice President for Academic Affairs The Pennsylvania State University University Park, Pa.

Sir:

Thanks to the generosity of Mr. Ernest E Quantrell, this college has made awards of $1,000 for the past 20 years, and judging from the enquiries, I should be disappointed if others have not followed our example.

ALAN SIMPSON Dean of the College University of Chicago Chicago

Moo U

Sir:

How dare you! On the official seal, it's "Iowa State University of Science and Technology." Some prefer "Not-the-Football-One, ' others "Moo U." But "Iowa State College of Agriculture and Mechanical Ar s [Oct. 5]?" Man, that's gone.

ALEX HERSHAFT Ames, Iowa

P:So it is. The name was changed last July.--ED.

Architect at Work

Sir:

In your Oct. 5 article on Finnish Architect Alvar Aalto, you report: "Once while designing Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Baker House in 1947, he turned out the whole staff at midnight, for three hours paced the office floor without a word, thinking furiously, finally dashed off the drawings."

This is not accurate. My memory tells me clearly that one person did stay all night with him. Aalto came in about 11:30 p.m. and sat down to study the drawings his helpers had been working on all week. One by one, they all straggled home by about 2 a.m., leaving only the skinny neophyte [myself] with his boss, who was'stiil sitting at the front desk, chin on hands, looking at the drawings. Aalto remained in tha, position without moving until about 6 a.m.; whether he was asleep or not is not known, since the assistant was afraid to go look. Then Aalto stirred and began to draw with soft colored pencils until about 8 a.m. It was a magnificent rendering of the main floor plan and foretold a great building. He is a great architect.

FRED BASSETTI Seattle

Showing the Light

Sir:

Rabbi Hertzberg [who urged peaceful theological coexistence between Christians and Jews--Sept. 28] apparently does not understand Christianity, as regrettably many Christians do not. There can never be any proper relaxation of missionary zeal for the church. For the Christian, Christ comes first and martyrdom is preferable to compromise.

(THE REV.) H. W. FAIRBROTHER St. Matthias' Episcopal Church Baltimore

Sir:

Jewish blood has been spilled for 17 centuries in attempts to purge us of our "sins" and lead us to salvation through Jesus. I think the time is ripe for Christian leaders to try to convert Christians to Christianity and to leave the Jews alone.

PERETZ M. KATZ Forest Hills, N.Y.

Sir:

Re your statement that Judaism is traditionally opposed to proselytizing. Why don't you scrutinize the Old Testament? Ruth the Moabite-is a good starter.

EVA STEINBERG Astoria, N.Y.

Hell's Fire

Sir:

I was disappointed to find that in our age of so-called enlightenment so little progress has been made toward solving the main issues of our destiny. It took 43 theologians five years of study to reach the conclusion that, after all, Hell may not be a place of fiery torment but a state of loneliness and frustration. This still makes very little difference in view of the Bible's numerous statements that Hell is the common grave of all mankind and where "man hath no pre-eminence above a beast [Ecclesiastes 3:19]."

MRS. J. A. NELMES Toronto

Sir:

Your article, under the heading "Hell of Loneliness," which told of the United Church of Canada's publishing a booklet that repudiates Hell as a place of fire and torment, really sickened me. The men responsible are playing right into Satan's hands. A little study into God's Holy Word should convince anyone who desires to know the truth that Hell is just what Jesus said it is, a place of fire and torment.

ALBERT W. WEBER Barrington, N.J.

Sir:

About Heaven and Hell: the humans-in-Heaven idea probably began about 1000 B.C. with Greek hero worship. Previously Heaven was for gods only. Since Hell had been for everybody, good or bad, maybe it seemed inconceivable that it should be a tormenting place.

RICHARD HILL

Toronto

*"Our country! in her intercourse with foreign nations may she always be in the right; but our country, right or wrong!" -Who said to her Jewish mother-in-law Naomi: "Whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God [Ruth 1:16]."

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